100 MY FARM. 



into February. We, on the contrary, have need to 

 store forage for at least six months in the year. Hay 

 begins to go out of the bays with the first of Novem- 

 ber at the latest, and there is rarely a good bite \ipon 

 the pastures until the tenth of May. For this reason 

 there is required a great breadth of barn room. 



The high cost of labor, too, forbids that distribu- 

 tion of the farm offices over a considerable area of 

 surface, which is characteristic of the British stead- 

 ing. The tall buildings, which are just now so much 

 in vogue with enterprising American farmers, situated 

 by preference upon swiftly sloping land, and giving an 

 upper floor for forage, a second and lower one for 

 granary and cattle, and a third for manure pit, have 

 been suggested and commended chiefly for their great 

 economy of labor ; one man easily caring for a herd, 

 under these conditions of lodgment, which upon the 

 old system would demand two or three. 



Machinery, too, which must presently come to do 

 most of the indoor work upon a well-managed farm 

 of any considerable size, will require for its effective 

 service compact buildings. 



Let me repeat the conditions of good American 

 barns. They must suffice for ample protection of the 

 harvested crops ; ample and warm shelter for the ani- 

 mals ; security against waste of manurial resources ; 

 and such compactness of arrangement as shall war- 



